Long, 67, lived in a rooftop apartment in a North Second Street
in Harrisburg building. Her life revolved around her job at the
Kinney Shoe Co. in Shiremanstown and feeding stray cats. Her
charred body was found by firefighters responding to a March 11,
1994 blaze. She had been beaten, stomped, strangled and possibly
raped.

THE SERIAL KILLER: ANDREW DILLON

Dillon is serving four life terms for the slayings of four women
killed between September 1990 and July 1995. Dillon, was living
in a halfway house in Harrisburg when M. Geneva Long was
murdered, but during weekend furloughs, he stayed with his
then-girlfriend in a room less than 100 feet from Long's
apartment, where she was killed.

• 12:45 p.m.: David Gladden , who is being held on a marijuana
charge, is released from Dauphin County Prison after a district
justice sentences him to time served from his March 1 arrest.

• 3:30 p.m.: According to her police statement, Debra Hammaker,
Andrew Dillon's then-girlfriend, who lives in a third-floor room
across from Long's apartment, arrives home from her job as a
cook and takes a nap.

• 4:30 p.m.: According to Hammaker's statement,
Dillon wakes up her up to say he's going to check in at Community
Corrections Center on Cameron Street, where he was sent after his
parole from state prison on theft charges.

• 5:15 p.m.: M. Geneva Long arrives at Market Square on her usual
bus home from work at the Kinney Shoe Co. in Shiremanstown. Police
assume she walked to her apartment as usual.

• 6:30 p.m.: Authorities responding to a fire in Long's apartment
at 227 N. Second St. find her badly burned body lying on her bed.

Maybe it's sheer coincidence that a serial killer who targeted
elderly women was staying in a room next to 67-year-old M. Geneva
Long when she was beaten and strangled in 1994.

And it could be just chance that the way Long was killed --
stomped, dumped on a bed and set on fire -- almost identically
matched the death of one of serial killer Andrew Dillon 's four
known victims.

It's also possible that the mentally retarded David Gladden , who
was released from prison that day, in less than five hours found a
key to Long 's apartment, recruited a man he barely knew to
burglarize it and then killed Long , as a Dauphin County jury found
in 1995.

And perhaps the sole witness against Gladden is now lying when he
says police coerced him into saying he saw Gladden kill Long .

If it weren't so tragic, the case against Gladden almost seems like
a cruel joke -- from the police investigation that turned away from
Dillon based on the word of a rapist trying to save himself from
new charges, to the trial, where everyone involved in the case,
including Gladden 's attorney, knew about Dillon , but no one
mentioned him.

Dauphin County District Attorney Edward M. Marsico Jr. agreed that
there appears to be major problems with the verdict and re-opened
the case when it was brought to his attention by The Patriot-News.

But after a review turned up no new evidence or DNA that would
warrant reversing Gladden 's conviction, Marsico said there is
nothing that can be done.

"Obviously, we don't want to see anyone innocent in jail, but at
this point, Mr. Gladden stands convicted," Marsico said.

Gladden , who is serving life without the possibility of parole, has
exhausted his appeals. Attorneys for Gladden said the case
represents a breakdown in the justice system at every level.

Royce Morris, whose firm, Goldberg Katzman, agreed to represent
Gladden at no cost, said no jury would have convicted Gladden if it
had had all the evidence.

"Mr. Gladden has never changed his story -- he's innocent," Morris
said. "Yes, he stands convicted of this horrific crime, but his
conviction is based on testimony from witnesses that were corrupt
and polluted sources and the jury was never made aware of the
evidence that this crime fit the pattern of an admitted serial
killer who had access to the victim. It's an issue of fairness: the
law may not present an avenue for Mr. Gladden to get a new day in
court but justice demands it."

So who killed M. Geneva Long ? Andrew Dillon , the calculating serial
killer who raped and stomped old white ladies to death for his
sadistic pleasure? Or David Gladden , the bumbling, petty burglar
who a court-appointed psychologist said was functioning at a
third-grade level?

When visited by a reporter in June at the State Correctional
Institution at Mahanoy, Gladden broke down crying when shown
Dillon 's record of killing women.

"You mean I've been doing all this for nothing?" he asked,
gesturing at the prison surroundings that have been his home for 10
years.

When told he would know better than anyone whether he was wrongly
convicted, Gladden replied, "I know, but no one has ever proved it
to me before."

A clockwork life

On March 11, 1994, Harrisburg was recovering from its 16th storm of
a brutal winter. With a couple feet of snow already on the ground,
the city was spared when the latest storm fizzled into rain and
sleet.

M. Geneva Long , a recluse who lived in a small rooftop apartment
off an alley in back of 227 N. Second St., went about her routine.
She took the bus to work at the Kinney Shoe Co. in Shiremanstown
where she was an office worker.

Patrick Dealy, who rented an apartment and ran a hair salon on the
second floor of the building, said Long lived her life like
clockwork. She would go to work and come home to her cluttered
apartment, where she would watch a small black-and-white TV.

He said the highlight of the Perry County native's life was putting
bowls of food and milk out her window to feed stray cats on the
roof.

She was somewhat paranoid and had told acquaintances that people
had stolen inexpensive items from her apartment, often blaming the
landlord. Yet her niece, Lenny Baumbaugh, told police she would
answer the door without asking who was there.

"She wasn't totally right; she had a nervous breakdown years
earlier," Baumbaugh said. "She kept to herself. Her apartment
wasn't very secure. Anybody could have broken into the windows. But
nothing I could do would get her out of there."

The lock on Long 's doorknob was broken, but she refused to use the
deadbolt, Baumbaugh and Dealy said. Long would peek out of her
blinds at the comings and goings of people who lived across the
roof from her, Dealy said.

At that time, 227 N. Second St. contained a pool hall on the first
floor, Dealy's salon on the second, and four rooms on the third
floor, where the occupants shared a kitchen and bathroom.

Debra Hammaker rented one of the third-floor rooms. Her boyfriend,
Andrew Dillon , had just been released from state prison after
serving time on theft charges and was living at a halfway house on
Cameron Street. He stayed with Hammaker on furloughs from Thursday
to Monday.

The front entrance to the apartments was on Second Street, but a
hallway adjoining Long 's apartment served as a fire escape for
residents in the front and led to stairs that exited the rear of
the building. Residents often used the stairs to leave the
building.

The door at the bottom of the stairs was self-locking, and only
Long had a key to enter from the outside, according to George
Kaldes, who owned the building at the time. But the door on the
roof was always open, Kaldes said.

Police believe Long arrived at Market Square on her usual bus about
5:15 p.m. and walked to her apartment.

Dealing with murder
Shortly after 6:30 p.m., Harrisburg firefighters, responding to a
call about a fire in Long 's apartment, found her charred body on a
smoldering bed.

What was left of her winter clothes and boots was melted onto her
body. She was partially covered with papers and debris. Her purse
was next to her on the bed.

At first, city arson investigators Dennis Woodring and Walter B.
Coy thought the blaze was caused by faulty wiring. It wasn't until
the next day that pathologist Dr. Wayne Ross determined they were
dealing with a murder.

Long 's killer was savage. He pummeled her head and face until she
was bruised and bleeding, an autopsy showed. Two of her ribs were
broken by what Ross said was a knee or shoe stomping her. Ross
speculated that the perpetrator might have knelt on Long while
strangling her.

Injuries to her vagina led Ross to suspect a sex crime, and he
gathered swabbings from her mouth and genitals to test for semen. A
lab analysis revealed none.

In the following days, Woodring and Coy canvassed the area,
focusing on people living in the building.

Dealy, the hairdresser, said they asked him to take a polygraph
test. When he failed, they accused him of the murder, Dealy said.
Police threw evidence photos on a desk in front of him and yelled,
"Start telling the truth!" Dealy said.

They then turned to Hammaker, who told police she came home from
working at the Stop Lunch restaurant in the first block of North
Second Street around 3:30 p.m. and went to bed.

According to her statement to police, Hammaker said her
boyfriend, Andrew Dillon , woke her around 4:30 and told her he
was going to the Community Corrections Center on Cameron Street
to check in. The next thing she knew, someone was shouting for
her to get out of the apartment because of the fire, she said.

Outside, Dillon walked up to her, and they waited until it was safe
to go inside, she said.

Police didn't know what they were dealing with at the time, but
they knew something wasn't right with Dillon 's story.

There was no record of him signing in at the corrections center.
His story and Hammaker's didn't match. He said he had visited her
at the Stop Lunch twice and got the key to her apartment. He
claimed he was window-shopping in Strawberry Square at the time of
the murder. He said he returned to the Stop Lunch and a cabdriver
named Joe told him there was a fire down the street.

When asked if he knew Long , Dillon said, "I only saw her once. I
was shoveling snow, and I saw her," according to his March 22,
1994, statement.

The next day, police re-interviewed Hammaker, a ninth-grade dropout
who worked as a cook, and her story coincided with Dillon 's.

Several days later, police conducted an analysis of Dillon 's and
Hammaker's statements. They believed "deception was evident in both
statements," according to police reports.

Hammaker, who now says she believes Dillon killed Long , was given a
polygraph test. Police could not find the results of that test.
Dillon refused to take one.

On April 4, 1994, Coy wrote, "At this time there is no physical
evidence or witnesses to this incident." He said he discussed the
case with then-District Attorney John F. Cherry and decided there
was not enough evidence to make an arrest.

Jailhouse conversation

A week later, police caught a break.

Donald "Goofball" Walborn, the self-proclaimed "eyes and ears" of
the Harrisburg police department, was arrested on arson charges. He
wanted to talk to the police about Long 's murder.

Walborn, a child molester, thief and alcoholic, had spent the
previous two decades in and out of prison. His latest arrest was
for setting fires to Dumpsters, a car and some junk.

By 1974, the Millersburg Area High School dropout had arrests for
assault, public drunkenness and disorderly conduct when he was
charged with trying to rape a 12-year-old girl. He pleaded guilty
to a reduced charge of indecent assault, spent 60 days in
Harrisburg Hospital for a mental-health evaluation, and was
sentenced to 6 to 23 months in the county prison.

Two years later, he was arrested and charged with raping a pregnant
woman while her son, 3, slept in an adjacent bedroom.

He had met the victim at a party and accompanied her and her son to
a Halloween parade. He walked her home and left. The woman, who was
eight months pregnant, said Walborn returned after she had put her
son to bed and forced his way into the apartment.

He was sentenced to 5 to 15 years in state prison on Feb. 8, 1977.

Walborn wasn't released until 1983, and then was in and out of jail
in the next several years on parole violations.

A month before Walborn went to police, he had been arrested and
charged with stealing 34 pairs of earrings worth $79 at a downtown
five-and-dime store, where he punched out a store employee who
tried to stop him.

He spent the next 29 days in Dauphin County Prison before raising
$25 to make bail.

It was during his time in jail that he claims Gladden , whose name
had not previously come up in the investigation, told him about the
old woman on Second Street.

He told police that Gladden , who was jailed on a
marijuana-possession charge, said he used to go into an old lady's
apartment and steal things such as antique jewelry. According to
Walborn, Gladden told him that the woman had caught him in her
apartment and threatened to call police.

"So he would tell me how she was an old bag, an old bitch and an
old grouch; she was easy to get," Walborn told police. "... And he
said that she was pretty, and it would be pretty the way that he
could get her, and it would look like an accident, that she had a
heart attack."

'It could of been my mother'
Gladden was released from jail around 12:45 p.m., March 11, the day
M. Geneva Long was killed.

Walborn was released 20 days later and said he saw Gladden in The
Pub bar downtown with Dealy, the hairdresser.

There is no evidence that anything of value was taken from Long 's
apartment. In fact, an envelope containing about $100 was found
under her bed. But Walborn, apparently believing robbery was the
motive, said Gladden was wearing nice clothes, gold chains, a watch
and rings, and was flashing money at the bar.

"I said, 'What's up with the old lady?'" a transcript of Walborn's
statement to police said. "He said, 'No wrap, she's been taking
care of and I have been taking care of real good.' And he pointed
at his clothes and he walked out the door."

Walborn said he thought Gladden murdered Long to get drug money and
suggested that he killed others. He offered to wear a wire to help
police.

"And to me, if I was any kind of person, I would say that Dave is
the one that knocked the old lady off, to make it look like an
accident," Walborn told investigators. "I hope this will help, I
mean it could of been my mother, it could it sic been my
grandmother that they knocked off. And I feel very bad about this
old lady that got knocked off and I hope that very soon that they
catch, if it was him, that they catch him and do what they have to
him. Cause punishment have to be done, it has to be stopped, all
the crimes on the street here."

Police gave Walborn a polygraph test. The available reports do not
say whether he passed, but police wanted to conduct another test.

A major break
At the time, Walborn had a secret he apparently kept from the
Harrisburg cops.

Five months earlier, he was staying at the mobile home of a family
in Millersburg in return for doing chores, according to police reports.

He was molesting their 12-year-old daughter, who slept on a couch
in the living room, where he often would sleep on the floor next to
her. He eventually raped her, and police and county Children and
Youth workers were investigating.

When a state trooper went to the home on Dec. 22, 1993, Walborn
drove up in a car with the girl, who was wearing an imitation
diamond ring and sitting next to him in the center of the front
seat. Her little brother was seated in the rear. Walborn admitted
that he gave the girl the ring and $20 "just for being a good
friend."

The trooper questioned the girl, and she turned over her panties as
evidence. Walborn knew he would likely be arrested when he told
city cops about Gladden .

His statement was followed by a series of events that appear to be
connected to his cooperation.

State police in Lykens issued a warrant for Walborn's arrest on sex
charges involving the Millersburg girl on May 12, 1994. Although he
was still in Dauphin County Prison, he wasn't immediately charged.

After a May 23 preliminary hearing in the arson case against
Walborn, the charge was reduced to criminal mischief, and bail was
set at $500. District Attorney Cherry asked that Walborn be
released on his own recognizance to report to Woodring and Coy.

Walborn wasn't picked up on the sex charges until June 22, 1994,
and was jailed in lieu of $25,000 bail.

He was released on Aug. 3, 1994, when former bondsman Charlie
Lawson posted bail. Walborn said police took care of the bail,
which would have cost $1,255. Lawson did not return phone calls for
this story.

Upon being released from prison, Walborn moved in with a Harrisburg
family and their 12-year-old granddaughter. He assaulted her in the
basement as she was doing laundry. A short time later he attacked
her outside, saying he had done it to many other girls and "had to
kill some of them," arrest papers state.

He landed back in prison on Oct. 10, 1994.

Facing the possibility of more than 100 years in prison, Walborn
went to police with a new story.

He said a 22-year-old small-time burglar and thief named James A.
Carson Jr. was with Gladden when M. Geneva Long was killed.

Walborn knew Carson from the county jail and downtown bars. Walborn
said he told police that Carson told him about the "trouble
downtown" he had had with Gladden .

There are no formal reports available about these statements
because police classified Walborn as a "reliable confidential
informant." Attorneys in the case and the jury would never know who
started the ball rolling.

Although he never testified, Walborn received a major break for his
cooperation when he came up for sentencing on Sept. 11, 1995.
Walborn received 5 to 10 years on the two rape charges and the
earrings theft.

Several days before Walborn informed on Gladden and Carson,
Harrisburg police were confronted with another inexplicable
atrocity that no one connected to the Long murder.